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European Impro Intensive 2013 Report of the ERASMUS Intensive Programme Improvisation in European Higher Music Education: Improving Artistic Development and Professional Integration 30 October – 8 November 2013 Royal Conservatoire The Hague Grant Agreement Number ERA/IP/13/45 1 With the support of the Embassy of the United States of America. This project has been funded with the support of the European Commission. This project and this publication reflect the views of its authors and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which might be made of the information contained therein. 2 Contents 4. Introduction 5. Rationale of the project 6. Report of the October/November 2013 edition of the ERASMUS Intensive Programme 10. Programme Erasmus Impro Intensive November 2013 13. Programme seminar 2 November 14. Report of the public seminar “Improvisation and Today’s Concert Practice” 17. Article “Improvisation and Identity – a biographical perspective” 25. Improvisation in today’s concert practice – the case of the Scroll Ensemble 31. Impressions from the Third European Impro Intensive Nov. 2013 – Noam Sivan 35. List of participants 37. Biographies tutors 49. Who is who – students 3 Introduction This edition was the culmination of a three-year project initiated by the Royal Conservatoire in 2011, bringing together more than 60 students and around 40 teachers from many different countries across the globe over the entire project period. This year’s edition even saw participation from Japan in addition to the American connection developed during the second edition, which this time was made possible with the kind support of the American Embassy. The increased international interest in this project reflects the relevance of the project’s subject: improvisation in classical music. Even before this third edition started, one can already consider what an amazing journey the project has been. It has put the spotlights on an issue that in many conservatoires is still to be found in the dark corners of the curriculum, but which at the same time has the capacity to have an enormous impact on the artistic and technical development of young musicians. It has provided a wonderful (some even called it a life-changing) experience to students. It has built up an international community of experts in the field, all high-level artists that did not always know each other before this project started. And it has given institutions an unprecedented insight into curriculum and pedagogical approaches. It is interesting to follow the educational and artistic development of the project over the years. Whereas the first edition in January 2012 was mainly focused on improvisation training and how to teach improvisation, and the second edition in February 2013 on the dissemination of improvisation throughout the entire community of the Royal Conservatoire, during the third edition the ensembles have, following an initial preparatory period at the beginning of the intensive, delved deeper into improvisation approaches and styles with the aim to develop artistic results of the highest quality that were presented at the final concert. A remarkable international team of teachers was assembled to coach the development of the ensembles. However, a challenge lays ahead once this project is finished. What kind of impact will it really have on the curricula of our institutions? How do we continue with this unique cooperation and exchange of expertise? It is clear that, even with this third edition giving us a temporary ‘comma’ with the ERASMUS funding coming to its end, there is still much more to be done and ways will need to be found to make this possible. Let me take this opportunity to thank all students and professors for taking the time to come to The Hague for this unique event. Furthermore, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Karst de Jong, Bert Mooiman, Rolf Delfos, Gerda van Zelm, Johannes Boer, Wouter Turkenburg, Susanne van Els en Renee Jonker for their tireless support to this project. Many thanks should also be extended to the excellent organizing team, Irina Bedicova and Else van Ommen. Finally, a sincere word of gratitude should be extended to the ERASMUS programme and the ERASMUS National Agency for generously supporting this project over the years. Martin Prchal, vice-principal Royal Conservatoire The Hague 4 Rationale of the project This project wants to contribute to improving the artistic development and employability of future music graduates by improving the artistic, pedagogical and entrepreneurial dimension of professional music studies, as a response to the rapidly changing employment situation in the music profession. The music profession is undergoing rapid developments due to changes in the role of music in society at large. Examples of these developments are an increased interest in diverse musical styles by music listeners and a decrease of state support to the arts in general. As a consequence, where music training mainly prepared for a rather structured employment market with orchestras and music schools in the past, the future music profession will be needing musicians that are highly versatile in terms of musical styles, working methods and professional contexts. This ERASMUS Intensive Project seeks to address this complex situation by addressing the theme of improvisation in higher music education because of the following reasons: Improvisation and artistic development – there is an increased understanding that improvisation can be very effective in the training of any musician, and not just in the fields of jazz and early music. Improvisation can liberate musicians from written text and the technical restrictions of their musical instruments, which will improve their instrumental skills, musical understanding and freedom of expression. Improvisation and employability – whereas in the past musicians were able to focus on one particular musical style, future musicians will need to increase their employability by offering a varied menu of skills and knowledge to employers, including the ability to perform in ensembles and activities with different musical styles. These musical styles will include styles that use strong elements of improvisation, such as early music and jazz. Improvisation as a pedagogical tool – another important professional context in which future music professionals will be increasingly active, is the realisation of educational workshops in varied societal contexts (e.g. schools, retirement homes and community centres). Improvisation can serve as a powerful tool to develop pedagogical approaches for such workshops that include strong participatory elements for the audience. When used in an appropriate way, improvisation can enable musicians through simple schemes and exercises to engage audiences in the workshop in an active way. Improvisation and entrepreneurship – in order to be able to realise the workshops described in the previous point, musicians will need to increase their organisational and leadership skills, acting as true self-reliant entrepreneurs. This reflects the above-mentioned changes in the music profession, in which the number of permanent employment contracts is radically decreasing and musicians are increasingly active as self-employed workers. As a result, it will not suffice to address improvisation from a purely musical point of view: in order to complete the picture, issues such as the employment context and the entrepreneurial skills of the future musician will need to be addressed as well. 5 Report of the October/November 2013 Edition of the ERASMUS Intensive Programme This three-year project aims at bringing students, teachers and leading experts together from different musical backgrounds and European higher music education institutions to exchange information on new and effective approaches and methods on the teaching of improvisation, both from an artistic and pedagogical as well as a professional integration point of view. The following institutions participate in this project: Guildhall School of Music & Drama, Sibelius Academy Helsinki, Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, National University of Music Bucharest, Koninklijk Conservatorium Antwerpen, Norwegian Academy of Music Oslo, Hochschule für Musik Karlsruhe, Royal College of Music Stockholm, Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya, Conservatoire de Paris and the Royal Conservatoire The Hague (coordinating institution). The third edition of the project was implemented in line with the original and the renewal applications. As was mentioned in relation to the first project edition, the original idea (which in itself was quite innovative and perhaps somewhat unusual) of combining improvisation and employability worked very well once again. Also in this third and last edition, the first half of the project saw an intensive schedule in which students learned to improvise with the help of the teachers present, whereas in the second half of the project, the student improvisation ensembles were then prepared for context-related presentations, in which they were asked to lead an improvisation workshop themselves with external participants, mainly other students in the Royal Conservatoire that were participating in the IP. By staging these context-related presentations, the relevance of the project was taken to another level: from learning students how to improvise to learn students how to lead improvisation workshops themselves. As a result, the objectives in relation to pedagogy, employability, and entrepreneurship

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